Website Modernisation: Bring an Outdated Site into 2026
For sites that still work but feel ten years old: faster, mobile-first, accessible and legally current, without losing the rankings you already have.
- Typical duration
- 2–5 weeks
- Who you work with
- One point of contact, start to finish
Short answer
Website modernisation takes a site that still works but has fallen behind and brings it up to date: a new or refreshed design, a fast mobile-first build, accessibility and legal pages that meet 2026 rules, and AI-assisted rewriting of tired content. Every existing URL is mapped and redirected so the Google rankings the old site earned carry over.
Last reviewed
A website built in 2016 can still be standing in 2026 and still bring in the odd enquiry. That is exactly what makes it easy to ignore. Meanwhile the way people use it has changed underneath it: most visits now come from phones, Google judges sites on how fast they feel, accessibility rules apply to online shops and booking services, and customers increasingly ask an AI assistant before they search.
Modernisation is the work of catching up without throwing away what the old site earned.
What gets checked first
- Speed and mobile. How long the site takes to become usable on a mid-range phone over mobile data, and whether the important buttons are reachable with a thumb.
- Search. Which pages bring in traffic today, which searches they rank for, and which other sites link to them. This is what must survive the move.
- Accessibility. Contrast, headings, image descriptions, keyboard use and forms, against WCAG 2.2 AA.
- Legal. Company identification and the complaints book link in Portugal, or the Impressum in Germany, plus privacy policy, consent, self-hosted fonts, and leftovers such as the link to the EU dispute platform that closed in July 2025.
- Content. What is out of date, duplicated, or written for the business as it was rather than as it is.
Then the move
The new site is built alongside the old one. Every URL that matters is mapped to its new home with a permanent redirect, content that ranked is kept or improved, and nothing is deleted without a reason. After launch we watch Search Console for crawl errors and ranking changes, and fix anything that slips.
Where AI helps, and where it does not
AI is useful for the heavy lifting on content: turning a wall of old text into a clear service page, producing a first translation, writing alt text for two hundred product photos, or finding every page that still mentions last year’s prices. It is not trusted to publish anything on its own. Every page is read and approved by a person, usually you, before it goes live.
What you get
- An audit of the current site: speed, mobile, search, accessibility and legal
- A redirect map for every URL that has traffic or links
- A new design, or a refresh of the current one if the brand still works
- Aged content rewritten, with AI drafting and human editing
- Accessibility fixes against WCAG 2.2 AA
- A before and after report on speed and search visibility
Outcomes
- A site that loads quickly on a phone over mobile data
- Rankings and inbound links carried over through the move
- Legal pages, consent and accessibility brought up to current rules
Frequently asked questions
Will I lose my Google rankings if I redesign my site?
Not if the move is done carefully. Rankings drop after a redesign when URLs change without redirects, when pages that ranked are deleted, or when text that matched searches is replaced with slogans. We map every URL with traffic or links, redirect each one, keep or improve the content that ranked, and watch Search Console for the weeks after launch.
How do I know if my website is outdated?
The usual signs: it is slow or awkward on a phone, the design dates it, you cannot change anything without calling someone, it still links to services that no longer exist, or it is missing legal pages that are now required. If customers mention your Google profile more than your website, the site has usually stopped doing its job.
Can you keep my current system, such as WordPress?
Often, yes. If the platform suits how you work and is in decent shape, a refresh on the same system is cheaper and less disruptive. If it is held together by plugins nobody updates, moving to something simpler is usually the better investment. The audit says which.
How is AI used in a modernisation?
Mostly on the content: drafting clearer service pages from old ones, translating, writing image descriptions for accessibility, and checking hundreds of pages for broken links or outdated facts. Every page is edited and approved by a person before it goes live.
Let’s make your website work harder
Tell us about your business. You get a free, no-obligation proposal from whoever would do the work, with an honest view of what to fix first.
Working with small businesses in Portugal since 2019.